Recently, I just traveled to Singapore with a midnight flight. Why did I get myself into this? Well, it's because of the budget. Midnight flights are known to be cheaper, and when you're a traveler with limited amount of budget, it's necessary to get the cheapest flight you could get. After I booked my flight, now the question is what will I do after I arrived at midnight? Should I just head to town and just pay one more night for my hotel room in the city? Should I book a room in the nearest hotel? Or should I just stay at the airport? After a few considerations my friends and I decided to stay at the airport, but that was me. I will try to describe the options you have on this post, so that you can decide on your own, what will you do if you need to stay overnight at the airport.

First off, whether you're a transit or non-transit passenger you will have two options: staying in a hotel, or the airport. If you're lucky maybe you'll have a friend or family member who can give you accommodation for a few hours. Also if you're not really on the tight budget, you can just grab a taxi, head to the city, and stay at the hotel you've booked for your whole visit. However, if you're on the tight budget, then these are your only options:


If you have traveled way too far, you feel extremely tired, and you're looking for comfort, I suggest you to just book a room. There are a lot of hotels near the airport, so you can choose the fare that matches your budget. I also heard that there are hotels that let you pay per hour, so it could be put into consideration. It's better for you to book before you travel, so you can just head to the hotel and get your sleep.


You don't want to waste  your budget on a hotel room which you will only use just for few hours? Then your only choice is to stay at the airport. There are a lot of options on what to do on the airport, here are the main options that I know:
Changi Airport is known as the best airport in the world. It has a lot of facilities for transit passengers, like lounges, cinema room, internet room, etc (for more details I suggest you to open the website and browse to find what you will like best). However, if you're not a transit passenger then you will only be able to enjoy all these facilities, if you don't walk through immigration just yet. Also you will not be able to claim your luggage, because the conveyor belt comes after the immigration. Some people on their blogs said that it's okay to leave your luggage and then claim it later at the 'Lost & Found', but I'm not really comfortable with this option. It's up to you though, you can manage to bring your luggage as carry on into the plane with you, or if you're comfortable with the option to claim it later, you can just leave your baggage for a while. I also read that there are airport police patrolling at dawn, and people who aren't transit passengers will be escorted to the immigration. So, mind your choices well.

I landed on Terminal 1 and decided to just go through the immigration and see what I could do. After going through the immigration, you will be able to see the conveyor belt for the baggage and the exit door. After you walk out the exit door, you can find a lot of seats, and also escalators and elevators to the departure hall. You can also find Burger King and Starbucks, there are others like McDonald's in other terminals too. I actually went to Departure Hall and also found KFC. If you really need to sleep, you can sleep on the seats available, because I found some people just sleep there. You can also head into one of the restaurants or cafe which open for 24 hours, buy something, and just rest.


Basically, it will be quite hard to sleep at the airport, so there will be a chance that you will not have any sleep, like me. I just rested my eyes but couldn't really get into a deep sleep. However, it will be a really interesting experience and I didn't regret it at all. Happy traveling to you!

CN.